Western Publishing

Edward Henry Wadewitz, the 30-year-old son of German immigrants, worked at the West Side Printing Company in Racine, Wisconsin.[1] Western won exclusive book rights to all Walt Disney licensed characters in 1933, and in 1934 established an eastern printing plant at the former Fiat factory site in Poughkeepsie, New York.Western expanded to the West Coast in the early 1940s, opening an office in Beverly Hills to make it easier to do business with studios that owned the characters the company licensed.[7] Duplaix had the idea to produce a colorful, more durable and affordable children's book than those being published at that time which sold for $2 to $3.[5] Guild Press, Inc., a publisher of Catholic books, religious greeting cards, and gift wrap, was purchased in the early 1950s.[5] With partners Dell and Simon & Schuster, the company sponsored the Story Book Shop on Main Street, U.S.A., in Disneyland which opened on July 17, 1955, and closed April 1, 1995.[5] In the same year, the name Western Publishing Company was adopted and common stock was issued with some eighty percent owned by management or employees.[5] In 1961, Western opened another printing plant, in Cambridge, Maryland, and in 1970 acquired several companies, including Odyssey Press, a high school and college textbook publisher.Western bought Pocket Books' half-share in Golden Press in 1964 with 276,750 shares of its common stock valued at nearly $7.4 million.Artists & Writers Press, Inc., one of fourteen active subsidiaries, created books for publishers and commercial customers including Golden Books, Betty Crocker cookbooks, the Arts of Mankind series for Golden Press, and the four-volume Harper Encyclopedia of Science for Harper & Row.Capitol Publishing, purchased in 1961, originated and produced educational materials and games for children, as well as toys and novelty products.[5] In 1967, the Justice Department charged Golden Press and seventeen other publishers with illegally fixing prices of library editions of children's books.Each agreed to the terms of a consent judgment forbidding them from submitting rigged bids or conspiring with wholesalers to fix prices of sales to schools, libraries, or government agencies.Western purchased Skil-Craft Playthings, Inc., a leader in craft kits and a manufacturer of laboratory science sets for children based in Chicago, for 100,000 shares of common stock in 1968.In 1971, Western entered into an agreement with the Children's Television Workshop to produce Golden Books featuring the Muppets of Sesame Street.[citation needed] The year 1980 saw the launch of the Sesame Street Book Club and the relocation of the Skil-Craft manufacturing plant from Chicago to Fayetteville.[5] In 1992, Western celebrated the 50th anniversary of the introduction of Little Golden Books publishing a boxed set of the twelve original titles for $19.95.Bernstein wanted to sell Western's products in discount stores and supermarket and drugstore chains and spent $20 million to do so.[citation needed] These losses raised Western's debt to $250 million; its negative cash flow caused its bonds to be downgraded to junk status.Hasbro Inc. purchased the games and puzzles division for $105 million and the Fayetteville distribution center which handled them was put up for sale.Ritepoint and Adtrend, parts of Penn Corporation's advertising specialty division, were sold as was its direct-marketing continuity-club business.[13] However, DIC would pass off the purchase due to high costs[14] and instead Golden Books Family Entertainment was eventually acquired jointly by Classic Media, owner of the catalog of United Productions of America (UPA), and book publisher Random House in a bankruptcy auction for the $84.4 million on August 16, 2001.The editorial staff at the West Coast office over the years included: Eleanor Packer, Alice Cobb, Chase Craig, Zetta Devoe, Del Connell and Bill Spicer.As Murphy explained the split: With regard to a Western-Dell separation, this was by mutual agreement so that each company would be free to explore the potential business in the comics market without the self-imposed restrictions which formerly required Western and Dell to work exclusively with one another.In our previous relationship, Western Publishing Co. secured the rights, created the comics, printed them and shipped them out for Dell.[citation needed] In 2009, the company announced plans to launch new versions of various Gold Key characters, with former Valiant editor-in-chief Jim Shooter as head writer.[citation needed] From the 1940s to the 1980s, Western published several series of books for older children and young teenagers, initially under its Whitman line.Girls' mystery series included Trixie Belden, Ginny Gordon, Donna Parker, Meg Duncan and Trudy Phillips.The series, published from the 1950s to the 1970s, also included a number of titles licensed from popular movies and television shows: Lassie, The Adventures of Rin Tin Tin, many television Westerns, and Walt Disney's Spin and Marty and Annette (from the serial featuring Annette Funicello that aired on The Mickey Mouse Club.The company was also the original American publisher of The Adventures of Tintin, issuing six titles in English translation in 1959 and 1960, before discontinuing further releases because of what were considered disappointing sales.